Republican Party

By Brian Glyn Williams and Javed Rezayee | – Williams, Boston/Bamiyan. On November 13th yet another suicide bombing shredded the lives of people across the globe in a land whose seemingly endless conflict has once again been forgotten by many, if not most Americans. But, as devastating as that blast that took the lives of […]

Corruption

The Contango Tango: SecState Pompeo Pressures Saudis to Raise Gasoline Prices, Harming US Consumers

Juan Cole

Ann Arbor (Informed Comment) – Secretary of State Mike Pompeo had a phone call with Saudi crown prince Mohammed Bin Salman on Tuesday. So reports Sam Meredith at CNBC. Then the State Department issued a statement on Wednesday that said, “Secretary Pompeo and the Crown Prince focused on the need to maintain stability in global […]

Donald Trump

Trump trying to Bolster his Far Right Agenda with the Pandemic, but will it Expose his Utter Incompetence?

John Feffer

The Politics of the Coronavirus

Corruption

There’s a name for Trump playing down the threat and failing to take action against the virus: Institutional betrayal

The Conversation

By Anne P. DePrince and Joan M. Cook | – U.S. intel agencies issued dire, classified warnings to President Trump in January and February about the dangers posed by the coronavirus, according to revelations reported in The Washington Post. For weeks, U.S. communities coast to coast sounded the alarm. They didn’t have enough tests to […]

Authoritarianism

Viral Coups: Authoritarians like Trump and Israel’s Netanyahu see Coronavirus as Opportunity for Power Grab

H. Scott Prosterman

Oakland, Ca. (Special to Informed Comment) – The United States and Israel may be considered “liberal democracies,” though the US is technically a “republic;” and Israel’s brand of democracy is qualified by its selective application of human rights. Both Israeli PM Benjamin Netanyahu and President Donald Trump have ravaged traditional norms of government and social […]

Banking

What’s the Point of Bailing out Hurting CEOs if they Just use Funds to Buy Back Stock & Feather their Nests?

John Buell

Southwest Harbor, Maine (Special to Informed Comment) – Occasionally President Trump likes to play defender of the common man. The frequent attacks on NAFTA and the promise to replace it with a better trade deal are one instance. Recently the effort to build a bipartisan stimulus response to the deepening economic losses occasioned by the […]

Donald Trump

Trump, putting Profit Motive and Reelection over Public Health, Undermining Coronavirus Social Distancing Strategy

Juan Cole

Ann Arbor (Informed Comment) – Trump’s daily dog and pony show, which he holds at 6-8 pm every evening to catch audiences tuning in for the day’s news and reach families after supper, took a dire turn on Monday. The big cable news networks irresponsibly just turn their screens over to Trump, who spews a […]

Donald Trump

“Get it Yourselves!” – Trump’s ‘Every Man for himself’ Approach to the Covid-19 National Emergency

John Feffer

( Foreign Policy in Focus) – A crisis, according to self-help and leadership books, reveals much about a person’s character. The same can be said of a nation’s character. Since the latest pandemic began to spread out of China in 2020, countries responded in very different ways to the challenge. There was ingenuity, inflexibility, incomprehension, […]

Donald Trump

Iran’s Ayatollah Khamenei Pulls a Trump on Coronavirus: Denies Own Responsibility, Blames a Foreign Country (US)

Juan Cole

Ann Arbor (Informed Comment) – Trump and his cronies in the GOP got high-level, frantic briefings from US intelligence in January and February that the coronavirus would produce a major pandemic and send the US economy into a tailspin. That would have been the time to order test kits (rather than having Jared Kushner futz […]